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Tuesday, 17 December 2013

Prolegomena

"We live, as we dreamplay RPGs -- alone. . . ."

I haven't had a regular gaming group in a few years, and computer RPGs only hold my interest for so long. I've always preferred tabletop RPGs, and have been a fan of solitaire gaming ever since I got ahold of the random dungeon generation in Best of Dragon magazine vol. 1 when I was 11.

I've been playing through dozens of solitaire adventures (mostly for T&T and Das Schwarze Auge) but I have recently been tempted by the more open, free-form GM emulators and the like. I do love solitaire adventures to bits, but they don't offer much of a sense of connectedness. My solo adventurer's 'campaign' is essentially a list of dungeons entered and bad guys defeated.

Half the reason I like RPGs is for the characters and the stories their adventures tell, but I like the game aspect as well. I like rolling the dice to see what happens.

I've played a lot of games over the past 30 years, and have some definite preferences. There are games I wouldn't mind playing with actual people, but for one reason or another I would never consider solo. I'm really not interested in rules-lite systems, but I'm equally put off by rules bloat (Pathfinder, I'm looking in your direction) and games with built-in power creep so severe that after the first supplement no one can use a character from the main book (Palladium). A lot of modern gaming systems leave me a bit cold; rules that are too slick are often a distraction, and do more to pull me out of the fantasy world and into the numbers game. I don't really believe in universal systems; some games just feel better with certain rules.

For me, Call of Cthulhu is only ever Chaosium's Basic system. I vacillate between 2nd and 3rd edition Runequest. If I want high fantasy, I'll probably just grab my Moldvay basic & expert sets, or possibly LotFP. If I want low fantasy, 4th ed. Das schwarze Auge. If I want space opera (and I rarely do), then Star Wars d6; hard sci-fi is Traveller (classic or Mongoose). I am not the biggest fan of pulp, nor of cinematic combat systems (though Legend seems like it might be fun for some swords&sorcery).

I've been embroiled in new solo Traveller campaign lately, so this blog will be focussing on that for a while. I'll also be posting any tricks, tools, or tables I make, in case anyone else can use them.